


And You Can Have My Heart

by love_stella



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Author doesn't want to spoil anything with tags, Friends to Lovers, Getting Together, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-21
Updated: 2018-12-21
Packaged: 2019-09-23 20:36:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,594
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17087306
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/love_stella/pseuds/love_stella
Summary: The flyers needed a goalie, so they made one.Or5 times Philippe Myers took care of Carter Hart, +1 time Carter took care of Phil





	And You Can Have My Heart

**Author's Note:**

  * For [heybernia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/heybernia/gifts).



> IF YOU OR ANYONE YOU KNOW IS MENTIONED IN THIS FIC PLEASE TURN AWAY NOW AND SAVE US ALL THE EMBARRASSMENT
> 
> Heather,  
> I'm sure you already know this is me (or you'll be able to figure it out soon) but I love you a lot and I hope this is everything you wanted. 
> 
> Thanks to T for the beta and A and N for the cheerleading. 
> 
> See end notes for spoilery warnings

1.

Phil’s in the press box the entire game, and even though he’s itching to be on the ice with his new brothers, the lights combined with the raucousness of the crowd is making his head _ache_ and all he really wants to do is go back to his hotel room like the trainer told him to and nothing but pure stubbornness is keeping him in his seat. He _needs_ to be here, doing what he can to cheer them on, and if they lose the game because he’s not there he needs to see it instead of hiding in the dark like a coward.

Phil sees Carter’s heart break when Terry’s shot gets past him in the shootout, and can see Nico’s legs give out when he gets to the bench after Canada’s last chance misses his stick.

One of Hockey Canada’s handlers comes to get him from the press box, explaining that Phil has to be on the ice for the ceremony “for the sportsmanship blah blah blah” even though the team doctor is insisting that he very much doesn’t need his headaches to get worse from the lights and the noise, but before the doctor gets a chance to finish his sentence Phil’s being dragged out the door into the lion’s den that is Bell Centre.

Phil knows he should go to Carter first, make sure he’s alright like Hextall and the rest of the Flyers management would want him to, but as soon as he sees Jer he’s wrapped in a tight hug and that’s all he can focus on for now. Besides, Connor’s got Carter taken care of, it’s a goalie thing, and no one else can know what Carter’s going through right now.

The ceremony happens in a blur, Phil thinks he smiled when he got the medal draped around his neck – not that he wants the gaudy _silver_ medal but it’s not like he can refuse it anyways – but judging from the way the handlers are glaring at him from behind the cameras he’s sure he failed, and he does his best not to cave in on himself clutching his aching head while the Americans sing the national anthem and celebrate, waving their victory in the entire arena’s faces.

Phil’s sure everyone’s plan for the night is to go back to the hotel and get as drunk as they need to forget what just happened,

“It’s not your job to babysit me _Philippe_ ,” Carter slurs.

“I just want to make sure you’re ok,” Phil says.

“Well I’m not, but this is helping,” Carter says, waving the bottle around as if Phil can’t clearly see it.

Phil blanches as the noise from the hotel room echoes into the hall, and that’s enough to snap Carter out of his tantrum.

“Hey, are _you_ ok?”

“‘M fine, it’s not me I’m worried about right now,” Phil mutters. “Just, keep your voice down please.”

“Let’s go back to my room, Ingy’s not coming back for a while,” Carter says, grabbing Phil’s hand and leading him down the hall.

Phil’s pretty sure he’s the one who’s supposed to be taking care of Carter right now, making sure his programming is still running properly and that he won’t stay devastated by the loss,

“Can we just not do this right now,” Carter pleads as Phil gets up to grab the equipment they need to run Carter’s diagnostics, the cables that Phil’s become so familiar with over the past year since the Flyers signed him to defend Carter on the ice and take care of him off of it.

“They won’t be happy,” Phil says, pretending like he’s not already putting everything back in the cold metal briefcase.

“They can go fuck themselves,” Carter says, and if Phil wasn’t listening closer he wouldn’t hear the way his voice is choked up like he’s trying not to cry.

“Well I don’t think that’s possible for Hak but who knows,” Phil jokes, trying to lighten the mood, all traces of headache gone in favor of making sure his friend is alright.

That earns a choked laugh before Carter starts crying, before Phil can blink he’s full on snotty nosed, red faced bawling, Phil doesn’t remember crossing the room and pulling Carter into his arms but that’s what’s happening.

Phil’s not sure what he tells Carter, – he knows he said something about it not being his fault and that he played as well as he could have – anything to calm both of them down if Phil’s being honest with himself.

Phil pulls the blanket over himself and Carter, and before he drifts off to sleep he swears he hears Carter murmur a quiet “thank you” even though Phil’s not sure exactly what it’s for. He’s just being a good teammate and doing the job the Flyers want him to do, it’s nothing special.

 

2.

At some point during the day, a Flyers staffer starts handing a phone to different guys, and Phil’s lucky he’s with Carter when it’s his turn for whatever they’re trying to do.

“Wanna take a selfie with me?” Carter asks, and there’s no way Phil can say no to a selfie, he knows he looks good but would never say that to anyone.

“Ok but we’ve gotta use the dog filter it’s iconic,” Phil says.

“Do you even use any other filters?” Carter asks, which, fair but Phil _is_ a husky and he’s always going to take the time to rep his boys. Besides, if he’s gonna stick his tongue out he might as well have a dog’s tongue in the picture.

“Just take the picture Hartsy,” Phil laughs. Carter does just that, and Phil’s pleasantly surprised he ends up with the Dalmation face instead of the brown dog he usually ends up with.

As soon as they’re done talking the selfie, Phil notices Hextall and a few of the other Flyers head honchos watching him and Carter, and he _really_ doesn’t like the way the looks on their faces right now, like they’re waiting for their new toy to do something interesting instead of watching an actual person. Listen, Phil _knows_ that Carter isn’t human but _come on_ have some decency he’s not a science project he has feelings and a pretty great personality if Phil’s got anything to say about it.

Hextall must see Phil watching, because the next thing he knows it, Hextall walks over to them and shakes their hands, putting entirely too much pressure into the handshake with Carter than Phil is comfortable with.

“I’m going to need to talk to you boys later, stick around when you’re done eating,” he says, and Phil’s not embarrassed to admit that it makes him nervous. “I just need to make sure everything’s working properly and Phil, you’re going to need to help.”

“Yes sir,” Phil and Carter say in unison. In any other circumstance Phil would smile and probably say “Jinx” but he’s not feeling it right now, and from the look on Carter’s face, he’s not either.

Turns out Phil had every reason to worry, Hextall is going to watch him make sure everything’s running smoothly inside of Carter, and Phil hasn’t had an audience since he first started learning how to “operate” Carter. As much as he hates thinking about it like that, it’s the truth, and he’s proud that the Flyers trust him to take care of Carter.

Phil and Carter meet Hextall in one of the trainers’ hotel rooms, a white sheet of sanitary paper on one of the beds where Phil thinks that this all is going to happen.

“Carter, please get your shirt off and lie down on the bed and we can get started,” Hextall commands, again talking to Carter like he’s less than human.

Carter doesn’t waste any time, and Phil politely turns away until Carter taps him on the shoulder and hands him a pair of gloves, as if he’s got any diseases Phil can catch lingering inside of him.

“Ok Phil, let’s see what you’ve learned,” Hextall says, again talking to Phil instead of Carter even though Carter’s the one about to get his insides messed with.

Hextall quizzes Phil for what feels like an eternity, making sure Phil knows where the stabilizers are and that he knows which sensors do what, before he tells Phil to “go ahead, get in there and actually show me what you’ve got.”

Everything goes fine – Phil makes sure the right switches are turned on and the motors are all running smoothly, Hextall watching like a hawk the whole time – until Hextall points out that a couple of the wires look like they’re coming loose and runs out of the room to get a “very important phone call, excuse me,” and now Phil’s got to show his stuff without any backup.

Phil must connect one of the wires wrong, because the next thing he knows, Carter starts beeping loudly and he goes deathly still. _Oh nononono_ he thinks to himself, unable to stop the frantic shaking of his hands while he tries to think about what he just did and how to fix it. _Carter please holy fuck_ . Phil’s starting to sweat, and knows that he’s got to fix this _now_ before something bad –no _worse_ – happens to Carter.

Phil’s about to call Hextall into the room when all of a sudden, Carter’s eyes flutter and his mouth twitches, almost a smirk but not quite. Phil can’t move, he’s frozen, not sure of what he’s actually seeing. Maybe he’s delirious, breaking a robot can do that to you right?

Carter jolts up and spews a bunch of gibberish that Phil couldn’t understand under normal circumstances let alone _now_ , before blinking slowly and looking at Phil like nothing happened.

“Carter?” Phil asks, trying to keep the nerves out of his voice. He’s pretty sure he’s never been more terrified in his life.

“Sorry, I’m sorry,” Carter says. “Hextall fucking told me to do that, I’m so sorry.”

Phil’s not scared now, he’s pissed. “What the fuck dude I thought I killed you.”

“Hey, I’m really really sorry,” and Carter sounds so sincere that as mad as Phil is he knows he’ll forgive Carter as soon as his hands stop shaking. _Fucking android humor_ , Phil thinks, is what that must have been because he _knows_ Carter would never actually try to scare him like that.

“What the fuck, that was a test?” Phil asks, checking the wires he just messed with and making sure that everything’s really alright. As far as he can tell, it is, but right now Phil doesn’t trust himself.

“Yeah, he wanted to see how you’d react in an emergency,” Carter explains. “I told him it was a bad idea, but he didn’t listen.”

Phil’s torn between wanting to run out of the room and wanting to stay and make sure that Carter’s really ok.

“I just want to nap,” Carter says, which Phil thinks is understandable, shutting himself off must have taken a lot out of him. “You can come with if you want.”

“That’s probably a good idea, I don’t know if you should be alone,” Phil says.

“Just say you wanna snuggle with me, you look like you could use a nap too,” Carter half-jokes, and Phil thinks that sounds like a great idea.

 

3.

Carter hasn’t been answering his phone since the news got out about him catching mono, which, _that’s_ the cover story the Tips are using? Fucking _mono_? How does an android even catch mono?

Phil’s half asleep when it happens: Carter sends him a text saying that he wants to Skype after Phil gets out of practice that afternoon. He goes through the rest of the day on autopilot, barely paying attention to Nic as they go through their practice ritual and ignoring Sammy’s chirps about his “date” that night, all he cares about is getting home so he can make sure Carter’s alright.

Phil's trying not to let the worry show on his face when Carter answers the call, but something in his expression must give him away judging by the crease between Carter's eyebrows.

“I’m fine you don’t have to –” Carter starts before being cut of by Phil’s entirely reasonable and well intentioned grumpiness.

“You haven’t answered your phone since you’ve been out,” Phil whines. “You left me on read, how can i not worry?”

“I’m just feeling a little off,” Carter says. “Like wires get crossed and I don’t know _why_ or how to fix it and I just want to ignore it but obviously that’s not working.”

“Doesn’t Everett have a tech to make sure everything’s running properly?” he asks.

“Don’t start, Jeff’s been trying to get me in his office for two weeks,” Carter says.

“Well then why haven’t you seen him? Something’s gotta be seriously wrong if you’re still missing games. If Hexy trusts him he’s gotta be good Hartsy.”

“Because he’s not you,” Carter burts, “Jeff isn’t gentle and doesn’t talk to me while he fucks around with the wires. It’s uncomfortable and I don’t like it.”

“So you’d rather be out with fucking ‘ _mono’_ instead of letting him fix whatever’s wrong with you?” Phil shouts, and the way Carter flinches makes him realize that he needs to calm the fuck down.  “I’m sorry I just –”

“Yes, ok,” Carter says. “I’d rather be out for another month than let him inside. You can close your mouth, by the way, your face is too pretty to freeze like that.”

In his defense, how is Phil supposed to respond to that? He knows they’re close, they’ve had to be this past year, but Phil didn’t realize that Carter was either that sweet or that stubborn to risk never playing hockey again if it meant having a different tech check him out.

“I thought you knew that,” Carter says before Phil gets a chance to think of a response.

“I.... didn’t.”

“Oh, well now you do,” Carter says, looking anywhere but Phil’s face.    

Now that he’s able to properly look at Carter, the way hair is flopping onto his forehead and a blush is growing on his cheeks, Phil’s able to focus on something other than worry: the butterflies in his stomach that have been behaving themselves are now threatening to escape after Carter’s confession.

Nic barging into his room is enough to jar Phil out of his reverie before he starts telling Carter about how much he misses him, even if half of what they do together is mess around with Carter’s wires after arguing about what they watch on tv – Phil insists on The Office but usually lets Carter watch his vampire show since he needs to be as comfortable as possible while Phil runs the diagnostic.

Speaking of the diagnostic, Phil really should be running one right now, even if they’re on the other side of the country.

Phil says as much, and forces the butterflies even further down when Carter rolls his eyes and whines out a “yes dad” before getting up and grabbing the USB cable that literally controls his life.

“I’m ready when you are,” Carter says once he’s hooked up to a quite-frankly terrifying looking computer.

Before Phil can blink, his phone is bombarded with numbers and symbols he’s come to know as Carter’s essence, and from what he can see everything looks normal.

“This doesn’t make sense, you’re fine,” Phil tells him, and gets a confused head tilt in return.

“But, I’m not,” Carter stammers. “You know I’m not, the team knows I’m not.”

“Guess we’ve just gotta take a look inside and see what’s up,” Phil says, more confused than ever.

Phil looks away while Carter pulls his shirt over his head, might as well make sure Nic’s actually gone and not just hiding behind the half-closed door, and by the time he looks Carter’s got his chest open and his mechanical heart open for Phil to look at as best he can over the grainy video feed.

“Well that explains it,” Phil says when he sees one of the wires sparking brightly the closer he looks at it.

“...No I don’t think that’s the problem,” Carter says, the wire sparking almost as brightly as the red on his cheeks as he pokes at it. “Hey ouch, this one just cut me.”

“Shit,” Phil mutters, “Do you still have that putty I gave you over the summer?”

“Duh,” he says, already disconnecting the useless monitor so he can dig through his nightstand to grab said putty, holding it up victoriously and letting out a “whoop” when he finds it.

“Great, now put a dab of it – do not actually dab or I’ll kill you – around the part that cut you – yes like that, perfect – and hopefully that’ll fix everything?” Phil says, nodding in approval as Carter does what he says.

“Thanks man, I couldn’t have done it without you,” Carter says, pretending to swoon.

“Clearly,” Phil laughs. “You should get something to eat, I’ll talk to you later.”

“Yes dad, goodnight,” the brat says before waving goodbye and ending the call.

If Phil stares at the black screen for the next two minutes, no one needs to know, especially not Carter.

 

4.

Carter’s first loss comes in his second start with the Phantoms. He doesn’t even last two periods, getting pulled after giving up a fourth goal to the Thunderbirds on 16 shots. Phil’s not going to say it, knows that Carter is beating himself up on the bench watching the team get annihilated 7-0 even though it’s not his fault that the team’s playing like shit.

Phil’s definitely not going to admit what he’s thinking: that Carter was _made_ to be better than this, _designed_ to be the best possible goalie and save the Flyers for the rest of his career. He was unstoppable in juniors, and Phil knows that as stupid as it is to think because he _knows_ that there’s a learning curve in the AHL – has figured that out for himself last season with all the “selfish” penalties – but he also knows that the Flyers organization is counting on him to be better than this.  

As much as he’s trying not to, Phil keeps looking over at Carter while he’s waiting for the puck to drop, trying not to let his heart break at the way Carter’s pushed his snapback down to hide his eyes so he doesn’t have to see the cameras or look any of their teammates in the eyes.

Carter is the first into the locker room while Phil’s one of the last, reassuring Anthony that he doesn’t need to talk to Carter, Phil’s got everything under control. Anthony seems to believe him, which Phil’s thankful for because he’s never been more nervous. He’s seen Carter upset before, was there during the Gold Medal game, but Phil knows that playing pro is a different ballgame than anything they did when they were kids.

Phil doesn’t say anything when he gets to the locker room, just fist bumps Nic and quickly locks their arms together like they always do before going over to Carter and tapping his ankle with his skate and sitting in the stall next to his.

The rest of the guys give them a wide birth, not ignoring them but not actively trying to involve them in any locker room shenanigans, and Phil’s grateful for it.

Phil’s sure that Hextall’s already on the phone with Coach Gordon, asking “what happened” and telling him to make sure Phil does his duties and makes sure everything’s alright with Carter _mechanically_ . Phil really should get over the sick feeling in his stomach whenever he thinks about how Hextall only seems to think of Carter as a toy, instead of a rookie with too many expectations placed on him, but right now his emotions are threatening to boil over and he really wants to punch a wall right now instead of doing something stupid like starting to cry with how much his heart _hurts_ for Carter.  

Phil and Carter still haven’t actually said anything, both of them just happy to share the space in silence when Coach comes over looking like he’d rather be anywhere than there.

“Sorry boys,” he says, and he really does sound sorry. Phil’s always liked Coach, he cares about his players even when they fuck up. “Phil, could you take Carter to the trainer’s room and run some diagnostics? Hextall wants to know what happened tonight and he thinks you’ll be able to figure it out.” Phil hears the unspoken “we played like shit tonight that’s what fucking happened” and tries not to smile.

They do just that, Phil waiting for Carter to hook himself up to the computer and seeing the familiar readout. Phil wishes there was something there, _anything_ to get Hextall off their backs, but there’s nothing. Everything looks normal, aside from some of the motors running a little hot, but that happens often enough that Phil’s not worried about it.

“Let me go tell Coach everything looks normal, he’ll probably let us leave before calling Hexy,” Phil says.

“I’ll be here,” Carter says, sounding every bit as tired as he looks. “We can go back to your place and play some Fortnite.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Phil says. “Be right back.”

As expected, Coach lets them go before he calls Hextall, – they all know that if the call happened before they escaped Phil and Carter wouldn’t be able to leave until they found some stupid reason for Carter’s performance – and before Phil knows it they’re pulling into his and Nic’s garage and piling into the living room to play some video games.

Nic ends up joining them online, Carter insists that he can actually play with them in the same room but Nic begs off with an excuse of “Phil gets sad when he dies, I can’t watch that.” Phil would chirp back, it’s not like he actually dies that often, but he can’t say Nic’s wrong, dying sucks _when it happens_.

They end up playing a few rounds, Phil’s happy to say that he only dies once after getting distracted healing Nic for the third time, and Carter looks as relaxed as he can while killing random people on the internet.

“This is really helping recharge my batteries,” Carter jokes. “Thanks man.”

“It’s what I’m here for,” Phil says, wishing his voice didn’t sound as sad as it does. Just once, he’d like to spend time with Carter without having to poke at wires or look at a computer screen filled with numbers that make his head hurt before they actually got to hang out.

“Hey, you know you’re more than just my tech right, no matter what Hexy thinks,” Carter says, putting down the controller and putting his hand on Phil’s knee. “You’re my friend, i love you.”

“Love you too,” Phil says, trying to keep his heart out of his throat. If only Carter knew how much he meant it.

 

5.

“Get up, I’m making you breakfast,” Phil says, yanking the covers off Carter.

Phil’s had enough practice making the meal: exactly three eggs and two slices of toast, every fucking morning. They don’t talk about the first time Phil made Carter breakfast, where he burned the toast so badly it set off the smoke detector in the hotel room and the eggs melted into the pan and they ended up tossing it over the balcony – listen, Phil’s sure the birds enjoyed the free meal so he doesn’t feel too badly about it.

“You know I can’t make it myself,” Carter whines. “It’s not the same.”

“You’re such a baby,” Phil laughs.

Carter always runs a little hot – all that electricity constantly running will do that to a guy – and he must see Phil shiver a little because the next thing Phil knows, Carter’s pressed up against his back and that’s a lot of skin contact that has Phil shivering in a whole different way.

“If I burn these eggs that’s your fault Hartsy, back off a little will you?” Phil tries to joke, doing everything he can to focus on the eggs in the skillet and not on the warm wall of heat against his back. That gets him a snort, and unfortunately for Phil that means hot breath on the back of his neck and a piece of egg shell in the skillet and egg yoke all over the stove top.

“Shit Phil be careful,” Carter says. “That’s important robot fuel.”

“Then get off me, I can’t concentrate with you breathing down my neck,” Phil says, hiding the scowl at Carter referring to himself as a robot. He’s so much more than that to Phil, robots are nothing but wires and cold steel while Carter is one of his best friends and so _human_ that it hurts sometimes. “I thought I was the best at making breakfast you don’t have to watch.”

“ _Fine_ Mr. Chief I’ll go shower while you cook so I don’t ruin your concentration,” and _that’s_ not going to help Phil focus at all, thanks Carter.

“Yeah go, you stink,” Phil says, gesturing for Carter to leave and giggling at Carter’s pouting face.

By the time Carter’s done in the shower, Phil’s done in the kitchen. This time Phil arranged the eggs in the shape of a smiley face, the slightly runny egg making the smile and the other two as the eyes with the toast above the plate – ears, to complete the aesthetic.

Phil’s not going to lie, he’s thought about mixing things up a little, something small like adding cheese to the eggs or putting peanut butter on the toast, but he can’t really bring himself to do it. The Flyers have Carter on this specific routine for a reason, and sure, cheese probably wouldn’t result in some kind of catastrophic meltdown but he’s not willing to risk it.

Carter gets the milk and chocolate syrup out of the fridge, Phil just ran out of actual chocolate milk but it’s not like stirring is too much work for a future NHL goalie.

“What’s with the chocolate milk, that’s the only thing I don’t understand,” Phil asks.

“It tastes good duh,” Carter laughs, mixing the chocolate syrup into the glass of milk so it’s the perfect consistency. “And Hexy thinks I need more protein so it’s a win-win.”

Phil’s not used to a quiet breakfast, in juniors Alex and Jer would always try to steal his food and last year Sammy wouldn’t shut up about brunch while Nic laughed his ass off and tried to wrestle Phil out of his chair. Phil misses his friends more than anything sometimes but he wouldn’t change this for the world, Carter facetiming his billet family while Phil talks to his mom on the phone.

It’s their routine, which is why Phil’s so shocked when Carter reaches over and takes a piece of bacon off Phil’s plate.

“Dude what the fuck?” Phil says. “That’s mine!”

Carter puts it back immediately, and Phil has to fight the urge to just give him the bacon when he sees the frown on his face.

“Sorry, this is just so boring,” Carter explains. “Can’t a guy just eat something else for a change?”

“If you want bacon Hartsy you can have some –” Phil starts before being cut of with a rapid series of “no no no’s” and “it could ruin _everything_.” Goalies are fucking superstitious as hell and Phil knows Carter’s even more superstitious than normal goalies, he has to be.

“Ok, hey calm down,” Phil says. “You don’t have to, I’m just saying we could probably talk to Hexy about switching it up if you wanted.”

“I’m allowed to pout aren’t I?” Carter says, an exaggerated pout with full lower lip action and wide eyes. “Thanks man, but I’m good.”

“If you’re sure,” Phil says.

“I am, the toast is really good today,” Carter says. “I could never make it this good.”

“Thanks Hartsy.”

 

+1

Phil’s waiting for Carter to get off the ice after practice, – he’s given up trying to wait the goalie out, he knows Carter’s stubborn and always _has_ to be the last one off the ice – he doesn’t like the way Carter kept staring off into space like he’s glitching when pucks were getting fired at him and he wants to get to the bottom of it.

“You should come over after practice,” Carter says before Phil’s has a chance to say anything. “I feel...bad.”

“Yeah, sure, you looked like you were glitching out there.”

As if to punctuate how bad he feels, Carter drifts off to the side and somehow doesn’t break eye contact with Phil while clearly not actually _seeing_ him, and it’s all Phil can do to catch him before he falls and hurts himself or worse.

“I’m driving you home, let’s go,” Phil says, no room for argument in his voice.

When they get to Carter’s place, Phil wastes no time grabbing the USB cables and hooking them up to the computer before giving the other end to Carter to plug into the back of his neck.  

Phil can’t understand what he’s reading, usually Carter’s diagnostics are simple enough: feedback loops and commands, but this is something totally different:

 

G ;;; 0

2

L ;u n  ./ c h

W1,::TH

M//3

 

is the only thing on the screen when Phil pulls up Carter’s programming.

“Well this is fucked,” Phil says, “No wonder you’re feeling weird, this is completely trashed what the hell I’m calling Hexy.”

“No, we don’t have to bother him, we can figure it out,” Carter stammers.

“No no no your programming hasn’t ever looked like this before, I have no idea what to do.”

“Try running Emergency Protocol 5, maybe that will help?” Carter says, his voice raising in what Phil thinks should be worry but somehow the tone doesn’t quite fit. If Phil didn’t know any better, Carter sounds more exasperated than worried, which the more Phil thinks about it, the more sense it makes, especially since it’s partially Phil’s fault that they can’t figure out what’s wrong.

“We’ve never run an Emergency Protocol before, should we get Hexy first,” Phil stammers. “What if something goes wrong I don’t want to hurt you.”

“Just trust me, ok,” Carter says. “Run it.”

Carter sounds so fucking _desperate_ that Phil keys in the code to log into the Emergency Protocols – Phil’s honestly not even sure how he’s doing it, Hextall only went over it once when Phil was just learning how to take care of Carter, and Phil hasn’t thought about it sense, but apparently once is enough when it comes to Carter – and before Phil knows it he’s forcing his hands to stop shaking as he enacts the fifth protocol and the data transfers to Carter’s mainframe.

Phil tries not to freak out when Carter’s eyes close and his chest stops moving while the data transfers, telling himself that he’ll give it 30 seconds before he actually starts to panic, but before those 30 seconds are up Carter opens his eyes and smiles at Phil like Phil’s the best thing he’s ever seen.

“Are you –” Phil starts to say, before Carter leans over and puts a gentle hand on Phil’s knee and puts his lips softly on Phil’s for a brief enough moment that Phil’s not even sure it happened. “Huh?”

“Emergency Protocol 5 is me kissing you Phil,” Carter explains, like that makes any sense at all. “Unless you didn’t want me to.”

Carter’s looking everywhere except Phil’s face, which is when Phil realizes that the only thing he said after the kiss was “Huh” and that’s not the best response to the boy you’ve liked since he came to Lehigh kissing you, so Phil rushes to put their lips together again, this time with a little more force, just so they can both feel it for sure.

“Does that answer your question?” Phil whispers against Carter’s mouth, not willing to actually pull away until he’s gotten another taste of his friend’s mouth.

“You’re a moron, I thought you’d figure it out earlier,” Carter says. “I called in a favor with Juuls and he hacked me to program that message.”

“What message,” Phil asks, he would have known if Carter was trying to tell him something, right?

“When you pulled up my diagnostic it said ‘Go to lunch with me.’ When you didn’t figure it out I had to resort to drastic measures.”

“Did Juuls hack the Emergency Protocols too?” Phil asks, getting ready to kill Noah for risking Carter’s life – or Phil assumes that’s what could have happened messing with those – before Carter cuts him off and assures him that “no, the Emergency Protocols are just whatever Hexy thinks I might need that’s not part of basic programming.”

“So he thinks you need to kiss people?” Phil asks, more confused than ever.

“It’s more of a confidence boost honestly,” Carter explains. “I was too nervous to straight up kiss you so what good is being a robot if I can’t use it to my advantage sometimes.”

“That’s the craziest thing I’ve ever heard.” Phil says, unable to keep the giggle out of his voice.

“Well it worked, didn’t it?” Carter laughs, before pulling Phil out of the chair so they can actually go to lunch.

“Yeah, it did,” Phil agrees, letting Carter lead him out of the apartment. He’d follow Carter anywhere right now, but lunch is a good place to start.

**Author's Note:**

> Warnings:  
> -Hextall makes Carter pretend to malfunction/die as a test for Phil, Phil freaks out but Carter's fine


End file.
